Tag Archives: Manhattan

Brownell and Bear, as captured by their close friend Debbie Jackson, on Thanksgiving Day 2007. We love you, Brownell, and we will miss your gallant partner, too.

WE begin on a sad note. The houndbloggers wish to send condolences to Iroquois Field Master Brownell Alexander Clark on the recent loss of her close friend, that most gallant field hunter Bear. We hope to write a fuller tribute to this brilliant and kind gentleman in the coming weeks, but, for now, we think there can be no better tribute than this beautiful photograph taken by Iroquois member Debbie Jackson. It’s the perfect image and says everything there is to say about Brownell and her Bear: impeccable, elegant, sporting, joyous, entirely at ease in the natural world, and in absolute harmony with each other, the ideal partnership.

Of hunters and habitat

The Associated Press printed this worrying statement this week in an article: “Hunting’s popularity has waned across much of the country as housing tracts replace forests, aging hunters hang up their guns, and kids plop down in front of Facebook rather than venture outside.”

Hunting with hounds depends on countryside and wildlife preservation--and on the generosity of landowners to keep their country open and undeveloped

Whatever your views on deer and dove hunting, or indeed other forms of hunting not involving horses and hounds, the loss of land is a major concern for foxhunters, too. And as the hunting population dwindles, more land could be under threat for development, which means loss of wildlife habitat and, in turn, loss of wildlife. So all those kids who are tuned in to Facebook might never get a chance to see a fox, unless it is scavenging among their families’ trash cans. And loss of habitat affects not just game animals like foxes and coyotes; it also takes out everything from field mice to herons to bears. From the AP article:

“‘As paradoxical as it may seem, if hunting were to disappear, a large amount of the funding that goes to restore all sorts of wildlife habitat, game and nongame species alike, would disappear,’ said Steve Sanetti, National Shooting Sports Foundation President.

“Hunting generates billions in retail sales and pumps hundreds of millions of dollars into government conservation efforts annual through license sales and federal taxes on firearms an ammunition sales.”

On horseback and in the country, not in front of a TV or computer screen! Some of the young riders pose with huntsman Lilla Mason at a children's meet this year at Iroquois.

As the story points out, hunting is still a pastime–or, in times of deep recession, a necessity to put food on the table–for millions of Americans. But as suburbs encroach, hunters age, and outdoor life slips lower on citizens’ list of activities, the implications for all outdoor sports are alarming. In Pennsylvania, hunting license sales have dropped 20 percent in the last 20 years. One of the effects? The state game commission has had to trim its pheasant repopulation program.

Nature lovers, hunters, conservationists, and family farmers should be natural allies in the effort to preserve natural habitat and the wildlife that live there. Because, as Pennsylvania Game Commission spokesman Gerald Feaser told the AP, “Whole farms turned into housing developments or shopping malls. Once that land is lost, you can’t get it back.”

Yoicks, indeed

Did you know that Manhattan was a foxhunting center for 70 years? It’s true, according to a great old story the houndbloggers found in a 1941 edition of The New Yorker magazine. The short piece featured an interview with J. Blan van Urk, author of the two-volume set “The Story of American Foxhunting.” Volume I was published in 1941, prompting The New Yorker‘s visit to van Urk’s apartment in the Dryden Hotel on 39th Street. Van Urk explained that foxhunting was a craze in the Big Apple between 1750 and 1820.

From the resulting story:

“The town was absolutely foxhunting mad in those days,” he said enthusiastically. …

In those days, the greater part of Manhattan, with the exception of a few rustic villages uptown, consisted of marshes, grassy valleys, and wooded uplands, with a few orchards and cleared fields here and there–ideal coursing country. Foxes were indigenous to the island, and you could pretty well count on starting one on the upper West Side. The big, highly organized hunts–the three biggest were the St. George, the Colonial, and the Belvidere–often set out from Cato’s Inn, which stood in what is now East 54th Street, two hundred feet east of Third Avenue. It was famous for its food, brandy, and Havana cigars.”

A local fox. Can anyone remind me who sent this wonderful photograph in? UPDATE: Thank you, Nancy Clinkinbeard! Nancy reminds us that she sent in this photograph, which was taken by Doug Watkins.

It is here that we must mournfully report that bagged foxes were commonly turned out at Cato’s Inn, a deplorable practice that rightly is considered unsporting and, well, shameful. Tsk, tsk, tsk on Manhattan’s early foxhunters!

The magazine reporter asked van Urk how he thought an old-fashioned Manhattan run might have gone, assuming it started in the East 50s, and here was van Urk’s answer:

“Naturally,” he said, “the fox wouldn’t head for the river. He’d head over toward the Waldorf-Astoria and Rockefeller Center. If he turned north, he’d have a choice of three or four courses in the rocks and hollows of what is now Central Park. If he turned south, he might find temporary sanctuary in the Inclenburg Woods, which covered Murray Hill then. Routed from there, he might skirt the edge of Sunfish Pond, now occupied by the Vanderbilt Hotel, and head for the woods of West 42nd Street, going through the fur-and-garment district.”

That’s pretty ironic. Or daring. Van Urk continued:

“A stouthearted fox might go south along Fifth Avenue, through Greenwich Village, and all the way down to Canal Street before he was caught.”

Or not caught, if he found a nice place to go to ground. Today, of course, finding any place to go to ground would be more difficult, owing to the vast amount of urban concrete in today’s Manhattan. What was it we were just reading about land preservation?

Puppies, puppies, puppies!

Meanwhile, back at the kennel … Baffle and Hawkeye’s puppies are growing! They’re also exploring everything in their nursery, as you can tell from the collection of photos here by the intrepid amateur photographer Dave Traxler. These photos were taken on Dec. 5. Is there anything better for the holiday season than warm, wiggly puppies? No, I didn’t think so!